Understanding and retaining vocabulary is vital to learning new subject matter. Therefore, teachers are always searching for improved ways to teach vocabulary so that students can understand the words' meanings when they are taught, apply the words in their proper context, and retain the words for future use. Further, retention in one subject area fosters conceptual associations and vocabulary building across all areas in which the method is employed.
Most existing methods for teaching vocabulary are designed for teaching only that relating to foreign languages. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 7,104,798 to Spaventa (“Spaventa”) discloses an apparatus and method for teaching a foreign language, whereby a teacher introduces vocabulary from a secondary language while the students look at a picture depicting the dialogue. U.S. Pat. No. 7,165,972 to Jones (“Jones”) also discloses an apparatus and method for teaching a foreign language. The apparatus essentially comprises a set of cards containing a word, phrase or sentence, in the student's primary language with a pronunciation key, and the corresponding word or phrase in the language to-be-learned, with a visual depiction of the word, phrase or sentence. The student reviews the information in the primary language and associates it with the corresponding information in the secondary language.
The above-described existing systems and methods have several shortcomings, aside from the fact that they teach only the vocabulary of a foreign language. First, even though the students learn the vocabulary in a way that is more exciting than simply reading and memorizing from a book or copying definitions from a dictionary, the students learn the vocabulary in the abstract. For example, in Jones, the students learn the words' meanings by comparing the new word to the known word and the picture and pronouncing the word. However, there is no current system or method for incorporating those individual words into larger or varying contexts in which they are actually used to connect to other concepts or topics. In other words, there is no system designed to ensure comprehension of the vocabulary term as it relates to the concept it describes or expresses. Spaventa's system and method also suffers from the same problem.
Second, the existing systems and methods do not force students to use the words in different contexts where the words have different meanings. For example, one of Jones's cards teaches the word “cart” as an apparatus for moving objects, but it does not teach that cart can be used as a verb; e.g., to transport. Again, Spaventa suffers from the same problem.
Third, the systems and methods described above can only be used in a relatively limited number of ways. For example, Jones's method of teaching is limited due to the fact that the cards cannot be used together, because each one contains a discrete sentence unrelated to other cards' sentences.
Finally, the above-described systems and methods do not disclose an apparatus or method for forcing students to revisit, or consistently use previously-learned vocabulary, throughout future lessons in the same or different subjects. Neither Jones nor Spaventa disclose using the newly-learned foreign vocabulary words in other subjects, such as a science or math lesson. Therefore, the student will not retain the vocabulary words, be able to apply them in the future, or apply the words in different contexts even if they understand the words at the time they are taught.
Accordingly, there is a need for a system and method for teaching vocabulary that: (1) is interactive, stimulating and appeals to students with different learning styles, such as auditory, visual and kinesthetic; (2) is not limited to teaching a foreign language but teaches vocabulary relating to other subjects as well; (3) teaches vocabulary in the service of conceptual knowledge-building; (4) teaches vocabulary in the context in which it is used; (5) provides varying contexts for words, especially those with multiple meanings; (6) can be used to teach vocabulary utilizing various pedagogical approaches; (7) forces students to consistently use or revisit the words during subsequent lessons relating to the same or different subjects; and (8) prompts students to use vocabulary of the academic subject in their speech and writing.